Brunei, 2009

I would

like to congratulate the President on his election, as

well as to express my appreciation to the outgoing

President for his contributions over the past year. I

would also like to thank the Secretary-General, his

staff and the agencies of the United Nations for doing

such a fine job all over the world in very difficult

situations. It is very much appreciated.

I like the theme for this year’s debate, but it is a

very long one. So I would like to say a few things

about the first two words, namely, effective responses.

I think that they are the most important ones. There is

no problem with the second word. We all know what

responses are, because we make them every day. But

“effective” is a far more difficult word, and that is

because none of us here actually decides what it means.

It is not up to us to judge whether our work is

successful or not. That is up to the next generation. In

other words, it is our children and grandchildren who

are going to look back at the past and see whether we

did a good job. That is the way it has always been.

That is what many of us in Brunei Darussalam

have been doing recently, because this year is an

important anniversary for us. It is now 25 years since

we joined the Organization. Those of us who were here

at that time remember it very well. We remember

exactly why we joined. It was a dangerous period, and

a small country like ours did not want to be left on its

own. We wanted to be part of a larger community, a

world community. But there was a real problem. The

cold war was on and nearly everyone was divided into

two camps. That meant that we had to choose sides.

That did not help us very much at all.

Looking at the United Nations today, I would

judge its response to the past 25 years as very

effective. Things are much better than they were back

then. Certainly, many of the old problems may still be

with us, such as terrorism, poverty, disease, war and

the 60-year struggle by the Palestinian people for

justice, hope and dignity. But we also have a lot of

good things going for us nowadays. We have much

more knowledge. Communication is better than ever

before. The best thing of all is that we are not divided

into two camps. As a result, we have far more

opportunities.

When our next generation looks back at us and

judges us, I think that the question they will be asking

will be: What did we do with those opportunities? In

other words, were our responses effective ones?

Getting back to where we are now, I think we have

opportunities to make a great response.

The Secretary-General and his staff have

important proposals for reform, change and

development. If we accept them and do something

about them, we can take the biggest opportunity of all:

we can change the whole direction of world affairs.

What is more, I think that this is exactly what people

want us to do.

There is a lot of support for change outside this

building. No one really wants to carry on being split up

into developed or developing nations any more, or as

first, second or third worlds. They want us to be in one

world, in one situation, sharing its problems and being

part of any solution.

That is the message many of us got after the first

Group of 20 (G-20) meeting, back in April of this year.

It seemed to give us a real choice — either to keep on

doing things the way we have always done since 1946

or to change directions and all work together, big and

small, regardless of background, culture or faith, and

find a new way into the twenty-first century.

This week’s G-20 meeting in Pittsburgh sent out

the same message, and it was good to hear. It is only a

soft message and a small change. The big decisions are

still being made for us, and not with us. But at least it

is a start. It is the kind of change we want to see, and

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there is nothing to stop us from taking it a long way

further. After all, it is not like 25 years ago. We have a

real choice and no one is forcing us to take sides. So

for the moment it is up to us. The key words, however,

are “for the moment”.

The G-20 are not the only ones sending us

messages. There are other very important ones. They

are coming from the environment, the climate, the

global economy and energy and food supplies, and they

all add up to a serious warning. They are telling us that

very soon the choice will not be ours to make. Any

changes will be made by forces that we cannot control.

That means any response may be largely ineffective.

When the next generation looks back at us, they may

not just be judging us. They could even be condemning

us.